The US-led bombing campaign against ISIS set a record in August

An
Iraqi army helicopter launches decoy flares over western
Mosul.Thomson
Reuters

The US-led coalition fighting ISIS in Iraq and Afghanistan
dropped 5,075 bombs during close-air-support, escort, or
interdiction operations in August, according to US Air
Forces Central Command data.

The August total was the highest of any month during the
three-year campaign against the terrorist group.

The previous monthly high was 4,848 in June. Each of first eight
months of 2017 has exceeded the amount of bombs dropped in any
other month of the campaign.

The number of weapons released through the first eight months of
2017 is 32,801, surpassing the 30,743 dropped all last year,
which was the previous annual high for the campaign.

The 13,109 sorties so far this year is on pace to fall short of
the total in 2016 and 2015 — both of which exceeded 21,100. The
8,249 sorties with at least one weapon deployed so far this year
are set to top last year's 11,825, however.

Christopher Woody/US Air Forces Central
Command

Both Iraq and Syria have seen intense urban fighting this year,
which often requires more active air support.

The battle to retake Mosul in Iraq began in October 2016 and
formally ended in July,
while the final stage of fighting for Raqqa, ISIS' self-declared
capital in Syria, began in June and
is ongoing.

Not all aircraft active over Iraq and Syria are under Air Forces
Central Command's control, so the figures likely understate
the total number of weapons deployed.

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis also intervened to
request more money for bombs in response to concerns about
expenditures in the US Central Command area of operations, which
includes the Middle East.

Mattis asked for about $3.5 billion more for "preferred
munitions," including 7,664 Hellfire missiles and 34,529 Joint
Direct Attack Munitions.

During his campaign, President Donald Trump promised to "bomb the hell out of
ISIS," and he appears to have keep that pledge.

Bombing during Operation Inherent Resolve against ISIS in Iraq
and Syria — the recent stages of which US commanders have
referred to as an "annihilation
campaign" — has reached "unprecedented levels" under Trump,
according to Micah
Zenko and Jennifer Wilson of the Council on Foreign Relations,
and the increase has extended to other areas, like Yemen and
Somalia, as well.

A
Kurdish fighter from the People's Protection Units (YPG) looks on
after an coalition airstrike in Raqqa, June 16,
2017.Thomson
Reuters

The intensified bombing appears to have yielded a higher civilian
death toll. There were at least 2,300 civilians killed by
coalition strikes during the Obama administration, and between
Trump's January 20 inauguration and mid-July, there had been over
2,200 civilian casualties, according to
monitoring group Airwars.

Other estimates put the
number of civilian deaths much higher, and there is similar
uncertainty about the number of ISIS fighters who have been
killed. Coalition officials have made several estimates about the
total slain, despite doubts
about the utility and reliability of body counts.

Army Gen. Raymond Thomas, head of US Special Operations Command,
said in July that "conservative estimates" put the number of ISIS
dead between 60,000 and
70,000, echoing an statement he made in February.

The Pentagon said in summer 2016 that there were 15,000 to 20,000
ISIS militants left in Iraq and Syria, and US officials said in
December that 50,000 of the terrorist group's fighters had been
killed — twice as many as
the UK defense minister claimed had been killed that same month.